


Ink and Snow

by RavenLexis



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Hogwarts Era, Hurt, I'm so sorry Draco, Ink, M/M, Pride, Snow, greed - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-03
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-13 01:50:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13560120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavenLexis/pseuds/RavenLexis
Summary: Green, green eyes, like the forest, like the grass, like the emerald that my mother has in her jewellery box, glared at me before he was gone and I knew that I made a mistake.





	Ink and Snow

**Author's Note:**

> Another story! Merlin, am I glad to see that [Obliviate](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12043692/chapters/27269346) was accepted so well. The comments, the kudos! Thank you!
> 
> This story was born from my idle thoughts, which drifted to Draco's hair (I know, it's weird, but we can't deny that he has wonderful hair). I'm preparing for my finals, so this is probably the only story I can share in a long while.
> 
> Anyway, thank you for clicking on this story and enjoy!

You know what’s ironic? Compared to others, I have the brightest hair and skin. My hair is so blond it’s almost silver and my skin is so pale that it’s almost vampiric. I’d prided myself as someone important and precious, because my parents had told me so. Whatever I wanted, my parents gave it to me, trying to make sure that I’d want for nothing. If anything, it taught me greed.

Endless, wholly-consuming, self-destructive greed.

At my young age, many people respected me because of my name. Malfoy. A pureblooded wizarding family, most elite and the richest in wealth and tradition, which is the family I was born into. I embraced that ever since I was old enough to understand it. Children my age wanted to be my best friend and adults never dared to refuse me anything and, yet again, it fed my greed.

Then he came along.

I hadn’t known who he was. When I first saw him, with clothes a few sizes bigger than him and hair as black as the sky dead in the night, I had wanted him as my friend. He wasn’t all that impressive, I can tell you that much. Rather, he was skinny –looking even more so with his baggy clothes- with his hair unruly and wild, eyeglasses held together by some kind of tape and chocolate skin, not dark but certainly much darker than my pale complexion.

From the looks of him, I knew that he didn’t know me, didn’t know my family. It excited me greatly because, surely, he would be impressed by what I can show to him? Surely this boy, with his hair dark as ink and skin dark as light chocolate, would be happy to befriend someone like me?

No, of course he wasn’t.

Green, green eyes, like the forest, like the grass, like the emerald that my mother has in her jewellery box, glared at me before he was gone and I knew that I made a mistake, somewhere, when I was talking to him. I felt bad because, while it was my intention to brag, it wasn’t my intention to offend him. But offend him I did, so I thought, _Well, he said he was going to Hogwarts too. I’ll apologise on the train and perhaps we can try again._

When I heard about Harry Potter attending Hogwarts, I searched for him on the train, keeping an eye out for hair as dark as ink and eyes as green as the forest.  Another person to befriend with and I imagined that maybe that boy from Madam Malkin’s and Harry Potter could be my best friends. Vince and Greg were nice to me, but they never quite understood how to play some imaginary adventure.

I saw him then, in the compartment rumoured to be Harry Potter’s, and when I asked where the Boy Who Lived was, he turned to me. I realised then that he was Harry Potter, and I introduced myself, proudly because that was how my parents taught me to. Before I could apologise, Weasley snorted. That irked me, someone like him dared to mock me even though he was a blood-traitor, so I did what my Father had told me. I stabbed him where it hurt.

And when I offered my hand to Potter, those green, green eyes narrowed the same way they had in Madam Malkin’s as he refused my friendship.

The greed roared at me then and I left, embarrassed at the rejection and the humiliation. Yellow. It’s my greed, that wholly-consuming, self-destructive greed, which bred my pride to demand his humiliation as he did to me.

I spent countless hours obsessing over the humiliation. With each failed attempts, it grew and my pride kept churning my stomach. It felt like wherever I went, there was the dark, dark hair and green, green eyes that I see. Yet no matter what I did, Potter only glanced for a second before looking away like I worth nothing more than a second of his time. Of course, I did notice how he tensed up whenever his friends were mocked.

And again, I stabbed where it hurt.

 

 

Needless to say, we hated each other for a long time. Taunts, mockery, pranks, anything to get him into trouble, I planned them. I watched him in the corridors and in classes we shared, trying to learn what I could to make him regret ever underestimating and dismissed me. Hate, pride, and greed drove me to keep tormenting him, but whether I liked it or not I found myself learning things about Potter that people might dismissed as nothing. The greed delighted in these discoveries, of how he held a quill, how he burrowed his brows in thought, how he chewed his bottom lip whenever he felt uneasy. My pride kept me from admitting that I noticed them and that my hate gave way to something else.

Still, dark hair and green eyes haunted me when he said that the Dark Lord had returned. Hurt and injured, but still fighting and grieving and I knew then that what I pretended was hate couldn’t be acknowledged as such any longer. But what else could I do except to continue? Too much bad blood between us to start anew, too hostile to even consider the chance to repair any damage he and I both caused to the other.

Irony. He’s dark where I’m light, but where we stood contradicted our physical features.

Of course, the thought didn’t occur to me until my Father finally came to me that summer. He looked tense, but there was something in his eyes as he told me that my time to make him proud had come. Proud of me. That was something I’d been trying to achieve for my whole life. So did it really come as a surprise when I bid as he wanted me to do?

Sixth year came with a new sense of fear and dread. My greed was suppressed and my pride was taken. My Father was so proud when he saw me accepting the Mark. Even I knew that regardless what my Father said about Malfoys born to be leaders, we were nothing more than slaves. I resolved to keep a low profile that year, but of course Potter picked that year to finally take me seriously.

It took all I had to keep my composure from breaking when I left him in that train. For a short while, I had hoped that episode would discourage him from following me. I had known that he’d be rescued somehow –he has a knack on being lucky at the most bizarre moments- but when the weight of his gaze settled on my back, I knew that I wouldn’t be so lucky.

Laughable, really, how on that year I got what I had always wanted when I didn’t want them any longer. Making my Father proud of me and getting Potter’s attention. Where was my Father when I won the Quidditch match against Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff? Where was he when I achieved the second best grade after Granger?

(Berating me for losing to the ‘insolent half-blood’ and the ‘filthy, disgusting mudblood’, that was where he was.)

(As for Potter... Well... I didn’t blame him for dismissing me any longer. He had faced the Dark Lord and live to tell the tale while I cowered and grovelled.)

(How pathetic of me.)

Sectumsempra was a nightmare actualised. I gained his attention in a bad way, after all, so the hatred in his green, green eyes came as no surprise to me, even though it did hurt. Before I passed out from the pain, I really had thought that I’d die. The pain flared from my torso up to my neck, almost reaching my face, and I had lost so much blood. I had made my peace that I’d die as a slave to a madman, had made my peace that no one would remembered me fondly –save for my Mother, Vince, and Greg-, and had accepted that mop of hair dark as ink and green eyes as the forest shining with hatred would be the last  memory I had.

I didn’t know if I should be relieved or horrified when I woke up and realised that I wasn’t dead. I honestly still don’t.

Facing Dumbledore only confirmed what I’d known all along that year. I couldn’t kill him, not even to save my Mother. Not even to save myself. I almost buckled in relief when he offered me and my Mother protection. My Father was beyond saving, no matter how much the thought pains me. But then the other Death Eaters showed up and I had to keep pretending that I wanted nothing more than to please the Dark Lord. My hope died as I watched the Killing Curse flew to Dumbledore. There was nothing left that I could cling to. Sad, pitiful, cowardly Draco Malfoy. I have often wondered what my child self would say if he ever saw what he’d become.

( _Where are your greed and pride, Draco? Where’s that haughty sneer and mockery of yours?_

Dead. My greed shattered to pieces while my pride was torn into tatters.

_Just like your dignity. Pathetic boy._

I know.)

 

 

I knew it was him the second I laid my eyes on him.

(How couldn’t I? I’d recognised him wherever, I spent too much time watching him not to.)

I had dreaded coming home that holiday, even from the hell that Hogwarts had become. The Carrows tortured so many students, too many for me to keep count, too many for me to help. All I could do was to hide the younger ones and to drag the injured to the Hospital wing. My home was no better. It was no longer the beautiful, safe place that I remembered from my childhood. Everything was stripped of its glory, leaving only a dark, dangerous place behind.  Wherever I looked, everything was black or white, even myself.  Muggles and Muggleborns alike were tortured to the point of exhaustion or death, their screams ringing through the halls.

( _Where’s that sickly yellow of greed? Where’s that red spark of wrath? Have you no pride?_

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

**I don’t know anything anymore.** )

Green, as the forest, as the grass, as the emerald that Aunt Bella stole from my Mother, was what gave him away, even with the swollen state of his face. Brown, like light chocolate, was his skin while dark brown hair, like coffee, and sun-tanned skin was Granger. Ginger, almost orange, and blue, like the sky that I hadn’t seen in a long time, was Weasley. _They’re alive_ , I thought, _thank Merlin they’re **alive**_.

“Is it him? Is it Potter?”

.

.

.

“I can’t be sure.” **_Get them out of here._**

 

 

Dazed, confused. How did I end up here? Where am I? Why am I locked in here? Who am I-

 

**_Nothing. There’s nothing left._ **

**Author's Note:**

> I would love to continue this story, but it might be a while considering my finals and all that exams lining up. Thank you for reading this! Please let me know what you think and leave some constructive criticism for me, I still have a lot to learn.
> 
> Thank you again and see you on another story soon! ^^


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